Isle of the Dead (36 page)

Making a non-committal remark, Nino rang off. The name hummed in his head – Rachel Pitt, from up north, the Lake District. Rachel Pitt … Grabbing the London telephone directory, he found three people called R. Pitt. After phoning the first two – Ronald Pitt and Rita Pitt – he tried the last number.

This was it. This
had
to be Rachel Pitt. He had found her. Now he could warn her. He could prevent her death … The
number rang. Again, and again. It rang out, then finally was answered.

Hi, this is Rachel. Sorry, there's no one here at the moment. If you want to leave me a message and number, feel free.

Distraught that she hadn't picked up, he left a message.

This is Nino Bergstrom. Please call me as soon as possible, it is urgent.
Please,
Ms Pitt, call me when you get this message.

Leaving his number, he put down the phone, and realised his hand was shaking.

Lake District, 30 December

Waking late, Rachel turned over in bed and opened her eyes. Where the hell was she? And then she remembered and stretched lazily. She had managed – by the sheer fluke of someone cancelling at the last minute – to rent a tiny cottage for Christmas and New Year, close to where her father had been born. It was in a village called Crook – a stone house hardly large enough for a hobbit, but cosy. ‘
El dar la bienvenida
,' Michael would have said, curling the Spanish vowels around his tongue … She shook off the thought of him, unwilling to let him in. The cottage was hers, filled with provisions, wine and plenty of cut logs for the fire. She did have neighbours, but it seemed that on both sides they were away for the festivities, which left Rachel pretty much alone. Only this was a different type of aloneness. This was away from London and the flat and it smelt, looked, and even felt different. It felt hopeful.

Since arriving the previous day she had walked endlessly, enjoying the landscape – such a contrast from built-up Battersea. She had even spent a whole hour watching a farmer rounding up sheep, not noticing that the rain had started and her boots were waterlogged. A peace she hadn't felt for years came like a salutation to another life, a choice she had long denied herself now possible. Up in the hills, with the rain and the sound of drinkers leaving the village pub at eleven, bathing in a small enamel bath and drinking water that tasted of the mountains, Rachel experienced an epiphany which was long overdue.

She had forgotten the loneliness which had dogged her. Even on her own, she wasn't as bereft as sitting in her flat and waiting, endlessly waiting, for the phone to ring. It was a relief not to have to think up ways to amuse, seduce, or interest her lover. It was a release not to be terrorised by her silent phone, or urgent text messages. And slowly Rachel came to realise that loving Michael had become a form of penance.

How could she be anything other than an appendage to his life? While she made him the nucleus of her world, he had a wife and children, a career, a dozen social duties and membership of clubs. When he was with her, he loved her. But how much of his attention could she hold when he was elsewhere?

The answer was brutal. But it was only up in the hills of the Lake District, away from pylons and mobile-phone masts, trains, subways and sirens, that she could hear it. And as
the days passed Rachel became dislocated from her previous life: her life with Michael. Instead her career slipped back into top gear, her attention moving back to the Hamlet Theatre. Amused, she lay back on the pillows, her hands behind her head, thinking of Angelico Vespucci.

It was a fabulous idea to write a play about him. She knew it, had always known it, but her ambition had waned as her neediness had grown. Ideas, words, images that would once have shimmered inside her had turned to ash and, incredulously, seeing her actions at arm's length, she did not know herself.

When she returned to Battersea, to the Hamlet Theatre, she would talk to Enright again, get him geed up about the play. She could do it, she could get him back on side. He was already hooked, she could see that. And besides, Rachel thought, there was plenty of interest in Vespucci now … She rolled over on to her side, looking out of the tiny window down into the village below. Since she arrived she hadn't bought a paper or turned on the television. She had left her mobile behind, and there was no telephone in the cottage. But she could remember only too well reading about The Skin Hunter before she left London. It had been on the news and all over the internet, and the last piece she had read had been sent from the killer – some lunatic taunting the police to find him before he killed again.

Yawning, Rachel pulled the duvet over her and closed her eyes. Soon it would be New Year, and she had already decided on her resolution. She would end the affair, slough it off
her body like dead skin, and return to the theatre. There she would hustle and bargain and push until Enright agreed to put on her play. He liked it. He was just nervous about her being a newcomer. So what? Rachel thought confidently. There had to be a beginning for everyone.

She relaxed into the pillows, sliding into sleep. Outside the last of the daylight slunk down into the lifeless trees, the hills snow-tipped and quiet, no cars about, no sounds. Only the drinkers inside the pub, calling last orders at the ringing of the bell.

30 December

As he walked up the front steps to the block of flats in Battersea, Nino could see a family watching television in a front room, and rang the ground-floor buzzer. He heard someone curse and an Indian man opened the door and stared at him.

‘What is it?'

‘I'm looking for Rachel Pitt,' Nino explained. ‘She lives upstairs.'

‘So?' the man asked as his wife moved into the hall behind him.

Pushing him aside, she smiled at Nino. ‘Can I help you?'

‘Rachel Pitt lives upstairs, doesn't she? I need to talk to her – it's urgent.'

‘Such a lovely girl, so very kind. Is it bad news?' the woman asked as her husband walked back into the front room.

‘Someone in her family's been taken ill,' Nino lied. ‘I can't get her on the phone and she's not answering her bell.'

‘Oh, she went away. She's on holiday until New Year—'

‘Until New Year?' Nino repeated sharply. ‘D'you know where's she gone?'

She put up her hands for a moment, calling for her husband. ‘Daruka! Daruka!'

He came back into the hall, his expression impatient. ‘What is it?'

‘Do you remember where Rachel said she was going on holiday? This gentleman needs to contact her; someone in the family is ill.'

Shaking his head, he moved closer. ‘She did tell me, but I can't … the mountains somewhere.'

‘The mountains?' Nino repeated. ‘In this country?'

‘Yes, yes, in England.'

‘The Peak District?' Nino offered.

‘No. That is not it.' He turned to his wife again, speaking Hindi', then turned back to Nino. ‘Up north—'

‘The Lake District?'

‘Yes!' he agreed, nodding. ‘That's it. She's gone to the Lake District.'

‘D'you know
where
in the Lakes?'

‘No. She said it was a village. That's all.'

As her husband moved back into the house the Indian woman looked at Nino sympathetically. ‘I'm so sorry we can't help you more.'

Frustrated, he hesitated on the doorstep. To have come so far and hit another dead end. Rachel Pitt was up in the Lake District, but where? It was a big place, with God knows
how many villages. It would take him days to check them all out. Days he didn't have.

Changing tack, he asked, ‘D'you know where her family live?'

‘She only has a mother, and she never talks about her. Not lately, anyway.' The woman paused, suddenly suspicious. ‘I thought you said it was someone in her family who was ill?'

‘It's a cousin. He lives abroad,' Nino said, hurrying on. ‘Look, I have to find Rachel. It's important. You have no idea how important.' Scribbling his name on a piece of paper he gave it to the woman. ‘Please, help me. I
have
to find her.'

She looked at him, concerned. ‘Is she in trouble?'

‘No,' he replied. ‘Worse. She's in danger.'

His glasses pushed up on his balding head, Gaspare was relaxing in the sitting room, listening to Rachmaninov. No matter how many times he heard the piece, he was moved by it, temporarily taken away from his anxieties, suspended between D flat and middle C. So when he noticed a sound break through the music, he was surprised and went downstairs.

Someone was knocking on the back door. He could see a large figure outlined against the glass and hesitated, remembering his previous heroics.

‘Mr Reni! Mr Reni!' the voice shouted.

Cautious, Gaspare approached the door. ‘Who is it?'

‘Jonathan Ravenscourt.'

Keeping the chain on, Gaspare opened the door a couple of inches. ‘What d'you want?'

Ravenscourt was flustered and dishevelled. ‘Can I come in?'

‘I don't think so. I don't know you.'

‘You know
of
me—'

‘Yes, and I don't like what I hear,' Gaspare replied, his tone sharp. ‘You got a friend of mine in trouble with the police – I had to dig him out of it.'

‘I retracted my statement!' Ravenscourt said, pushing at the door. ‘Look, I'm not going to hurt you, I've never hurt anyone in my life. Not physically anyway. What I did to Nino Bergstrom was wrong, but I've sorted it out with the police now and I want to help him out. For God's sake, let me in! On come on, Mr Reni, I ask you – do I look like a maniac?'

Relenting, Gaspare took off the safety chain and Ravens-court moved into the kitchen and took off his cashmere coat. His trousers and shoes were spattered with mud.

‘I came to ask you something,' he said, ‘something about the Titian—'

‘Not that bloody painting again,' Gaspare said dismissively. ‘I wish I'd never set eyes on the thing. It's been nothing but trouble—'

‘Of course you know all about it.'

‘Everything.'

‘About there being another murder?'

‘Yes, and Nino's on a wild goose chase, trying to find the last victim. The police can't find the killer, so God knows why he thinks he can.' He looked at Ravenscourt's dirtied clothes. ‘What happened to you?'

‘It's raining.'

‘Mud?'

‘
What?
'

‘You look like you've been rolling in mud.' Gaspare tilted his head to one side. ‘I don't want to offend you, Mr Ravens-court, but I don't believe a word of what you're telling me. I don't think you're trying to make up for what you did to Nino. I think,' he paused, wily to a fault, ‘that you're trying to find out what's going on. If we know anything. And if the Titian's been found—'

‘Am I that transparent?'

‘You're a dealer. I'm a dealer. So yes, to me you're
that
transparent,' Gaspare replied, as he moved away and began to prepare some coffee.

His instinct told him not to throw Johnny Ravenscourt out. He had every right to suspect him – and his motives. But there had to be a reason why Ravenscourt had come back to London. And Gaspare wanted to know what it was.

Passing him a cup of coffee, Gaspare poured himself another and took a seat at the kitchen table. Surprised, Ravenscourt followed his lead, loading two spoonfuls of sugar into the coffee and stirring it idly.

‘So the police aren't after you any more?'

‘I've satisfied them.'

‘Lucky boy,' Gaspare said drily, regarding Ravenscourt over the rim of his cup. ‘Did someone attack you?' He gestured to his clothes. ‘You can't have got that dirty walking in the rain.'

‘I fell over,' Ravenscourt replied shortly.

‘Fell or pushed?'

He smiled, sighing. ‘I had a ridiculous idea … er …
I thought that if I went back to where the Titian was originally found …' He shrugged, embarrassed. ‘I'm not light-footed and I fell over on the shingle—'

‘You went back to where Seraphina found the Titian? What for?'

‘I don't know,' Ravenscourt admitted. ‘Returning to the scene of the crime – something like that. Maybe I wanted to play amateur sleuth. Maybe I wanted to see what she saw. Be where she'd been. We were very close. Seraphina confided everything to me …' His voice trailed off. ‘Didn't it ever strike you as odd that she was so conveniently there? Just when the Titian washed up?' He sighed, frowning at the mud on his trousers. ‘If only someone else had found it, she'd still be alive. If only it had been some other person, some other woman.'

Thoughtful, Gaspare stared at him. ‘It was just a fluke that Seraphina found it—'

‘A fluke that killed her. A fluke that took away my best friend,' Ravenscourt replied pettishly, sipping his coffee. ‘Have you seen the papers today? Angelico Vespucci's becoming the
piatta del giorno.
' Gaspare smiled at the remark, but said nothing and let Ravenscourt continue. ‘You know, I made a very interesting purchase lately. I bought a portrait of Claudia Moroni—'

‘The second victim?'

Ravenscourt nodded. ‘Yes, it's of her and her brother. A testimony to their incest – quite sensational. I've had several dealers already asking to buy it. Anything connected to
Vespucci is much sought after. I expect a call from Jobo Kido any time now.' He pursed his lips. ‘Have you seen the Vespucci website today?'

‘No. Why?'

‘The killer's crowing again. Such an ego! If they catch him no doubt he'll make another fortune—'

Gaspare wasn't giving anything away. He and Nino might know the identity of the killer, but he wasn't about to tell Johnny Ravenscourt. He didn't trust him. Suspected he was, in some way, complicit. Did he know who the killer was? Or was he trying to find out if anyone else did?